The error was not yours, Somerled,” Eyvind said quietly, moving to the doorway. “It was mine. I failed to teach you the one lesson you could not do without: how to be a man.
But there are two sides to every fight. It starts from something small, a chance remark, a gesture made lightly. It grows from there. Both sides can be unjust. Both can be cruel.
It was quiet; so quiet. Didn’t these people know how to grieve for a good man? Didn’t they know how to weep, and scream with rage, and curse the powers of darkness in their sorrow? Didn’t they know how to hold one another, and dry one another’s tears, and tell tales of the things he had done, and of what he had been, to see him safe on his way? Where were the great fires, and the toasts in strong ale, and the scent of burning juniper?
A tale can start in many ways. Thus, it is many tales, and at the same time each of these is but one way of telling the same story.
Even when I was young and content and thought life would bring good things for me and mine, I didn’t believe in miracles.
The two of them are like open books, they speak the truth at the risk of their own lives, and when they keep silent their thoughts blaze like a beacon from their eyes.
The threads of many beliefs can run side by side; from time to time they tangle, and mesh into a stronger rope.
Love... it complicates our games, old friend, it insinuates itself, disrupting the most carefully laid plans and unmanning the most disciplined heart.
Somewhere, beneath that darkness, I had seen both strength and honor. But his words of despair mocked my efforts at healing.
There is learning in everything.
Only a fool gives up his one treasure.
Best face your fears straightaway; putting things off only makes them harder.
But in a song or a tale, anything is possible.
In time, your spirit will be with them again, perhaps in a great, spreading tree that shades the place where your grandchildren play. Maybe in a wide-winged eagle soaring aloft, watching as your dear one spreads her linen on the hawthorns to dry and looks suddenly to the sky, shading her eyes against the sunlight. You will be there, and they will know.
When the Fair Folk gave you an instruction, you followed it, whether it suited you or not. That was just the way it was.
The most reasonable of requests felt burdensome if a person had no choice in the matter.
Dawn will come,’ I told him quietly. ‘The night can be very dark; but I’ll stay by you until the sun rises. These shadows cannot touch you while I am here. Soon we’ll see the first hint of grey in the sky, the color of a pigeon’s coat, then the smallest touch of the sun’s finger, and one bird will be bold enough to wake first and sing of tall trees and open skies and freedom. Then all will brighten and color will wash across the earth and it will be a new day. I will stay with you, until then.
You’ve only just discovered you have a heart. Let it beat a little.
I saw that in him she had found her sun and moon, her stars and her dreams. Sorrow.
The god honors the faithful. And who is more true than a man who keeps his oath, though it breaks his heart?